Description: This four page newspaper cover section is in excellent condition, a few small edge rips. Folded open it measures 24 inch by 15 inch. All four pages are shown in photos. The chihuahua pictured on the cover is "Tiny" the test run dog for Laika aka Muttnik. Please see pictures. Will be sent as folded in a plastic bag in between stiff cardboard. Check out our store listings for more vintage newspapers including Louisville Kentucky's Courier-Journal. We ship securely worldwide. Please contact us with any questions. Thank you.

Laika (dubbed Muttnik by US press) was a Soviet space dog who was one of the first animals in space and the first to orbit the Earth. Laika was a stray mongrel from the streets of Moscow, she flew aboard the Sputnik 2 spacecraft, launched into low orbit on 3 November 1957. As the technology to re-enter the atmosphere had not yet been developed, Laika's survival was never expected. She died of hyperthermia hours into the flight, on the craft's fourth orbit. Little was known about the effects of spaceflight on living creatures at the time of Laika's mission, and animal flights were viewed by engineers as a necessary precursor to human missions. The experiment, which monitored Laika's vital signs, aimed to prove that a living organism could survive being launched into orbit and continue to function under conditions of weakened gravity and increased radiation, providing scientists with some of the first data on the biological effects of spaceflight. Laika's death was possibly caused by a failure of the central R‑7 sustainer to separate from the payload. The true cause and time of her death were not made public until 2002; instead, it was widely reported that she died when her oxygen ran out on day six or, as the Soviet government initially claimed, she was euthanised prior to oxygen depletion. In 2008, a small monument to Laika depicting her standing atop a rocket was unveiled near the military research facility in Moscow that prepared her flight. The American press dubbed her Muttnik as a pun on Sputnik. Sputnik is a name for multiple spacecrafts launched under the Soviet space program beginning in 1957. (wiki)